If you're interested in finding out what Personality Type you are . . . .

[Andy in Germany]

Its an L.O.B. I reckon. My ex wife had a psychology degree and she reckoned it was greatly debated within the profession, with little in the way of a consensus, and certainly not a tool suitable for use by non clinically trained HR wasters.

In the dibble they used to use it to screen firearms officers applications. I got binned off at this stage, despite having done 2 tours of N.I. and not having shot at anyone who didn't deserve it.

Meanwhile the test was happy to admit officers to firearms who, over the ensuing years, turned out to be a wife beater, another a shoplifter who was even brazen enough to sell his swag to work colleagues, and a dodgy chap giving intelligence to drug gangs for money...

So as you can tell, it really weeded out the bad 'uns. Not.

It certainly isn't a magic bullet, although from experience it may help a lot better if HR departments actually took some notice of the results. Reading that they have a team member who is an introvert and doesn't like being centre of attention then sending them off on "team building games" would seem to make the whole thing pointless.

I think it is more helpful for people with more "unusual" personality types, because it helps us understand why we react differently to situations and how we can use our strengths in our work.

However, as with everything on Psychology it's a theory, which has evidence for it and against it.

I'm not sure how it was supposed to help weed out coppers who shouldn't use firearms though.

 

[Drago]

My - limited - understanding is that the real problem is HR types genuinely not understanding the personality types they need, rather than the tool wrongly identifying them. They need clinically trained personnel to look in detail at the role, its duties and the wider circumstances of the business to identify prime personality types. HR don't do that, they simply think "ooh, sales, so we need someone outgoing..." with no empirical evidence that the outgoing prsonality cliche is indeed the correct one for the role.

Its so widely misunderstood in the outside world, including the public sector, as to be largely useless.

 

[Andy in Germany]

My - limited - understanding is that the real problem is HR types genuinely not understanding the personality types they need, rather than the tool wrongly identifying them. They need clinically trained personnel to look in detail at the role, its duties and the wider circumstances of the business to identify prime personality types. HR don't do that, they simply think "ooh, sales, so we need someone outgoing..." with no empirical evidence that the outgoing prsonality cliche is indeed the correct one for the role.

Its so widely misunderstood in the outside world, including the public sector, as to be largely useless.

Possibly also true,

I get the impression that a lot of organisations and HR departments often use things like personality tests because it's on the list of "things to do with a new team". They don't actually bother to think about the result.

Thus, one morning they would give us all "personality tests", which in my case showed that I am extremely creative and very good at helping people on a 1-1 basis for example, but I wouldn't handle loud boisterous team building games which made me an unwilling centre of attention, and then and then on the afternoon made us all take part in loud boisterous team building games which made me an unwilling centre of attention.

Then they wondered why I wasn't very communicative for the rest of the week.

A classic case of "why ask the question if you won't listen to the answer?".

 

[Jody]

Personality tests........ Back down the rabbit hole we go

Remarkably accurate given how few question it takes to put you in your box.

 

[LeetleGreyCells]

Reading the description given in my result, it is quite accurate. I found myself agreeing with the majority of statements in the profile.

 

[Eric Olthwaite]

I completed mine and it said:

"Stay where you are. Do not leave the house. Expect a visit shortly."

 

[Reynard]

Mine (Mediator INFP-T) was accurate. Mostly.

I recognized a lot about me in the blurb, but some of the stuff had me scratching my head and thinking wtf... The strengths & weaknesses was very accurate, the rest was a bit more hit-and-miss. Plus the stuff on parenthood - I can't comment on that at all, as I'm a single woman in my mid 40s who has no inclination to unleash sproglets upon the world.

 

[Salty seadog]

Adventurer.

 

[battered]

I filled it in. The reply came back:
You are a DICKHEAD.

 

[palinurus]

It certainly isn't a magic bullet, although from experience it may help a lot better if HR departments actually took some notice of the results.

It is curious. I've had a few of these sort of tests, usually in the context of a Team Roles workshop or something. As far as I could tell nothing changed as a result. This isn't bad -if anything did change, chances are things would've got worse- but it was an enormous waste of time.

Plus it's embarrassing. I was labelled as a 'plant' once after doing a Belbin Team Roles test. I had to stay in bed the following day. Ms P watered me along with the houseplants for a while afterwards.

Anyway- that stuff has long gone out of favour where I work. It's all 'leadership principles' now.

 

[Andy in Germany]

It is curious. I've had a few of these sort of tests, usually in the context of a Team Roles workshop or something. As far as I could tell nothing changed as a result. This isn't bad -if anything did change, chances are things would've got worse- but it was an enormous waste of time.

Plus it's embarrassing. I was labelled as a 'plant' once after doing a Belbin Team Roles test. I had to stay in bed the following day. Ms P watered me along with the houseplants for a while afterwards.

Anyway- that stuff has long gone out of favour where I work. It's all 'leadership principles' now.

Yes, but it meant they could tick the box so that's the main thing.

Surely you could say you identified as a human, and that would solve the problem.

 

[RoubaixCube]

Mediator INFP-T

This here speaks to me more than anything....

 

[Hover Fly]

I must be the type that gets bored with questionnaires easily.

 

[oldwheels]

Architect which seems to fit what they say.

 

[Ridgeway]

Result was "Exceutive" which i interpreted as twat